Robotic assistance in minimally invasive procedures, including Single Port Access (“SPA”) surgeries and percutaneous interventions, is emerging as a more patient-friendly, practice-enhancing and, eventually, cost-effective alternative to traditional open surgeries or free-hand interventions. Such a paradigm shift requires robust, scalable and efficient methodology for integrating multimodal sensing, e.g., tissue and molecular level imaging, controlled systems such as robots and haptic devices, and, the surgeon. Several factors may contribute to viable systems, including the seamless integration of real-time image guidance that can locally assess the tissue pathology and function, with operator interfacing allowing precise control of movement of surgical instruments.
Real-Time Image Guidance RTIG offers unique features for assessing the Area of Procedure (AoP), including assessing real-time tissue deformation and motion, secondary to the procedure or natural motion, related to, e.g. breathing or heartbeat; monitoring the tools in 3D; and updating the pathophysiology information of the targeted tissue. Real-Time Image Guidance may facilitate a methodological leap from current approaches of “keyhole” visualization, i.e. endoscopy or laparoscopy, and pre-operative imaging guidance, to a more global and informational-rich perception of the AoP, which can enable more complex surgeries, and better outcomes with conventional surgeries. Extensive groundbreaking work has been performed with different imaging modalities, including ultrasound (“US”), and magnetic resonance imaging (“MRI”), for both free-hand and robot-assisted procedures.
Another problem which must be addressed for robot-assisted procedures is how to guide the surgical instrument precisely to the desired location by an appropriate route. Where MRI is used as the imaging system for real time position monitoring, the surgery must be carried out in the space constraints of an MRI scanner, and must be operable in a large magnetic field. These issues are addressed by the systems of the present invention.